Reply to DH walked away from lunch date with me and the kids--am I overreacting?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]DH, the kids (3 and 5) and I were walking to a nearby restaurant for lunch this weekend when we got into a fight. It was a dumb recurrent fight and we both got very frustrated with each other very fast. I was expecting that we would snap at each other for a few minutes and then calm down, in large part b/c the kids were there and because everything had been fine otherwise. I think it's important to show kids that couples can have disagreements/fight but remain civil to each other and get past it.

But my DH said he felt like it would be better for him to go home or else he would say something that he would regret. So he just walked away. I was totally shocked and for about 20 minutes I was looking up the street expecting he would come back. I went ahead and had lunch with the kids at the restaurant we had been planning to go to, feeling totally bowled over but trying to act normal.

When we got home he put the kids down for a nap. Then we had a huge fight while they were sleeping in which I told him that his walking away had made me see him differently--as someone who would, literally, walk away from our family if he was mad at me. I felt it showed he was willing to put his anger at me above the kids.

He said he felt he had made the right decision by leaving because he thought "it was going in a bad direction" and we would have ended up having a serious fight in front of the kids, and that I was being melodramatic in my reaction.

We worked through the original fight (didn't resolve it but agreed to both try to work on the issues). But I am still feeling very unsettled by the walking away part. I believe him that he thought he was making the mature decision, but I think that is completely wrong and not how you should conduct yourself if you are a member of a family. I felt he was basically blaming me for his decision, too, by talking about the fight in the passive voice and acting like would have had no choice but to say something terrible to me if he had stayed, as opposed to regulating his own behavior.

So what do you think, DCUM? Was I overreacting or was this a really big deal? (Ducking.) [/quote]

Men process things differently and walking away to reevaluate the situation is what most men do.  Read about it.  Men are solvers and like to solve problems and come to conclusions.  You're overreacting and it's obvious you don't understand male behavior.  Walking away to come up with a different strategy and to approach the issue a different way is what men do.

Get over yourself[/quote]

OP here. This is the kind of idiocy that makes DCUM less useful than it would otherwise be. I have gotten some helpful feedback on this thread. Most of it was not complimentary to me, but I can deal with that. But the background chorus of sexism and vitriol makes it harder to sort out whether the rest of the comments are making good points or are just reflexively blaming women for everything. [/quote]

I'm a woman and think your response here is annoying. Some random mra crap has made an appearance but not the comment you're responding to. Makes me wonder what else you think is sexist.

Do your kids a  favor and don't interpret the "don't fight in front of your kids advice as sexist. Another person here who's parents fighting in front of them caused anxiety and pain. I am pretty good at conflict management but I'd say that I learned it the hard way. No fight that caused bad enough feelings for constant sniping and one person having to walk away is appropriate.[/quote]

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